I'm with the snowflake on this one. It's one thing to reward/punish students based for things nominally within a student's control, but attendance among kindergartners generally isn't within their control. You shouldn't "blame" 6-year-olds who have chronic diseases or catch contagious diseases that cause absences, or have parent(s)/guardian(s) who fails to get them to school on time for whatever reason. It would be different if they were addressing unexcused absences or tardiness which were the child's fault, as happens much more commonly with older students. But this just sounds messed up.

First, yes, she is being shamed. Imagine you are an adult (presumably you are) an adult workplace, and you are forced to strip out of your clothes and given a uniform to wear unlike all other employees because of poor performance. It is a type of psychological abuse.

Second, a child isn't a "snowflake" because she has an advocate for her welfare in life. Would it be better if no one in her life cared that she was crying at school?

Third, this school is farking nuts. This reminds me of those idiot parents in waiting rooms who ask their kids to do 10 million things while sitting perfectly still and yell at the kid for not doing the 10 million things perfectly.

The school should be happy that this kid finally showed up! Showing up for school and "having good work habits" are 100% the domain of a parent when a kid is 6 years old. They should spend more time figuring out why the parent can't get the kid to school rather than playing these stupid games about which clothes to wear on which day and who gets to wear what! That's like the parent with 10 million rules in the waiting room. Why are they even in school? I wish I could fly these morons to Sweden and show them a day in the life of a Swedish elementary school. They are farking humanistic! It is so easy to be a good parent/teacher/caregiver, and yet people fark it up all the time!

In the school I went to, poor attendance and grades resulted in mandatory after school study sessions. This made sense because the extra forced study time helped improve grades. Students with good grades had more free time. It was a reward system that made sense. I can understand where the school is coming from with this reward system, but since it doesn't actually relate to behavior that relates to performance, it's not going to be very effective.

I have a friend who works at a catholic school. They let the kids wear their street clothes on Friday providing they donate $5 to charity. HOW shiatTY IS THAT for the poor kids. Hey wanna make fun of the poor kids? They're the ones wearing uniforms on Friday! ha ha stupid poor kids.

JSam21:swingerofbirches: First, yes, she is being shamed. Imagine you are an adult (presumably you are) an adult workplace, and you are forced to strip out of your clothes and given a uniform to wear unlike all other employees because of poor performance. It is a type of psychological abuse.

Second, a child isn't a "snowflake" because she has an advocate for her welfare in life. Would it be better if no one in her life cared that she was crying at school?

Third, this school is farking nuts. This reminds me of those idiot parents in waiting rooms who ask their kids to do 10 million things while sitting perfectly still and yell at the kid for not doing the 10 million things perfectly.

The school should be happy that this kid finally showed up! Showing up for school and "having good work habits" are 100% the domain of a parent when a kid is 6 years old. They should spend more time figuring out why the parent can't get the kid to school rather than playing these stupid games about which clothes to wear on which day and who gets to wear what! That's like the parent with 10 million rules in the waiting room. Why are they even in school? I wish I could fly these morons to Sweden and show them a day in the life of a Swedish elementary school. They are farking humanistic! It is so easy to be a good parent/teacher/caregiver, and yet people fark it up all the time!

So... the parents don't have to follow the rules? They are the ones who caused the girl to not be allowed to participate in the reward. They are the ones that sent the girl to school in regular clothes, knowing she had to be in uniform. Yet it is the school's fault?

For real. Grandma should blame herself for 1. making her grand kid late enough times she didn't get an out of uniform day and 2. disregarding #1 and making the kid have to go to the office and change and be *traumatized*.

Everything in that article is grandma's fault (assuming there is no mom in this situation, which I got the impression there isn't).

Reminds me of the "Let them walk" controversy we had about 5 or 10 years ago, in the Chicagoland southern suburbs. It involved parents upset that their kids would not be allowed to participate in the graduation ceremony, simply because they hadn't met the requirements for actual graduation. The parents felt that the school administrators should "Let them walk", with robes and mortar board, and receive a piece of paper on stage, no matter whether they were getting a diploma or not, so that the child and family could celebrate, just like everyone else, and nobody would feel left out. The take away is, now a days, actually accomplishing something is irrelevant, it's being part of the farking show that's important. Oh yeah, and morons beget morons.

What I'd be curious to know is if the parents knew ahead of time that the kid didn't qualify for the reward and sent her in regular clothes anyhow. If they did know then they set her up for any humiliation she felt. If they didn't know then that is some piss poor communication going on by the school, the parents or both.

T Baggins:I'm with the snowflake on this one. It's one thing to reward/punish students based for things nominally within a student's control, but attendance among kindergartners generally isn't within their control. You shouldn't "blame" 6-year-olds who have chronic diseases or catch contagious diseases that cause absences, or have parent(s)/guardian(s) who fails to get them to school on time for whatever reason. It would be different if they were addressing unexcused absences or tardiness which were the child's fault, as happens much more commonly with older students. But this just sounds messed up.

Except that "blaming" students would mean something like keeping the non-perfect attendae students in at recess or the like.

The elementary school my mother works at (and that my nieces attend...yes on special permission) does stuff like this. Conduct, attendance, reading beyond what is required, et cetera--all those will get special rewards, and parents don't biatch and moan. (Well, 99.9999% of parents don't complain. One did, but that's because she is a biatchy asshole.)

What the school in the story is saying is "Good job! Now see what being dedicated to what you're doing will get you? Reflect on this as you grow up."

ThunderChicken:Soooo... Let's just throw it all to the breeze and stop teaching kids that there are repercussions for their actions early in life. Just let them do whatever they like and reward them the same as the kids that work for it. I'm sure that will teach them all a really great lesson about how life really works and encourage them to work harder.

That's been the hippie mantra since the '60s, if it feels good, do it!/that shiat isn't working very well is it?

Soooo... Let's just throw it all to the breeze and stop teaching kids that there are repercussions for their actions early in life. Just let them do whatever they like and reward them the same as the kids that work for it. I'm sure that will teach them all a really great lesson about how life really works and encourage them to work harder.

Why do Kindergartners have a uniform policy? There are only three reasons to have uniforms. First, it let's you keep out gang clothing, without having to nitpick what is and isn't gang attire. Are the five year old kids in this school part of a gang?

Second, to get people to confirm to an ideal of modesty. You know, so the students are not dressing too sexy, and causing other students to have impure thoughts. While the value of such moral thinking is questionable, what should not be, is that you don't really have to worry about rug rats trying to turn each other on. If you do worry about kindergartners being sexy, then you are probably the one with the problem.

Finally, you are trying to get everyone to confirm, so that you can reduce bullying, by making it less obvious whose families have more money and/or style, then anyone else. Do five year old kids talk smack about the kid wearing the fake Levi's?

Zarquon's Flat Tire:I remember getting an award for not getting written up all year. Now THAT was goddamn embarrassing.

I remember the kid who was the only student in High School to have never missed a day of school for any reason, and got a certificate for it. While everyone else was puzzled at the idea of someone never missing a day of school from their Freshmen year to their Senior year, I kind of wondered if he was going to grow up to be Bruce Willis from Unbreakable.